


A Precious Treasurebox

by Ncj700



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: #Also I think size kink?, #SHINY, #also breaking necks, #blood, #character death, #does this make me a sea fury?, #merfolk casually chatting about potential murder, #um, #warning for bodies, F/M, Gen, Kidge - Freeform, M/M, MerMay 2019, WARNING FOR GRAPHIC AQUEOUS MERMAID SEX., but i started writing on the 31st so im counting it, i'm late, not the mer babies though, there's fluff in this too i swear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-03
Updated: 2019-06-03
Packaged: 2020-04-06 22:27:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19071937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ncj700/pseuds/Ncj700
Summary: “Are those eggs?!”Katie’s anxiousness turned into something more irritable. “Well, they’re not clam-stones, genius. What else were you expecting? I’m not a dolphin!”An introduction to the courtship, curiosity, and commitment, between a deep dweller and a surface mer.





	A Precious Treasurebox

 So here we are, dragging the Kidge club down to the depths of filth. I came here for fluff and rainbows and good times, now I’m writing about sugar daddies, omegaverse and shark smut ~~next will be the dragon porn~~

Like really, heed my words and warnings my friends, I’m going to hell for this. I shouldn’t be allowed near a keyboard. Read at your peril. If you want to avoid the uh… explicit content... you can skip from ‘ _...as their weight dragged them back to the sands below _ ’ to the next scene, and you’ll be spared this monstrosity. Keith gets a bit handsy later, but its nowhere near an m-rating.

* * *

 

The depths of the ocean were boring places sometimes, for settled groups. Katie lived in such a settled group, in a cave not too far into the deep, still within sight of the shining. It wasn't too bad, she had many crevices and great underwater canyons to search as a youngling, develop her hunting skills, and learn about the world in safety, away from the danger of the landlings.

She spent more darkwaters and lightwaters than she knew to think of at the edge of the abyss, and had always found her way home. It had been a good place to spend the long period between being a hatchlings and her coming–of–age ceremony. The fish and shark hunts were plentiful, the seaweed lush and green, and the shellfish abundant. The currents that mapped the vast beyond were also close, bringing news from distant friendly tribes, and even new visitors.

As she outgrew her hatchling fins, and took on her second colours, Katie began to come into her own as a full member of her tribe; her tail was the colour of the bright kelps, with the golden shimmer of light weed, with claws that looked as though they had been dipped into the tendrils of a float-fish. Her fins were delicate, almost transparent, but strong and agile, and her hair was long, the colour of deeper weed forests and algae. 

She was small but she was a good hunter, and clever, helping to catch her tribe many baskets of fish even when Iverson had to stop hunting to carry his mate’s purse and help care for their clutch, stealing the rope-cages and nets from the long traps dropped by landling floating crafts. She’d even mastered the tricky method of catching floatfish without getting stung by their tendrils.

Despite all that, as a young, new-finned mer, the chasm had bored her; Katie had lived there all her life, seen its offerings, and needed something new, and so she took off with some other travellers amongst the currents, despite the appropriate share of courting trinkets she’d accrued.

Her travels earned her others too. Like the transparent, smooth, coloured sea stones woven with thin filament into a decoration for her tail that had come from the blue-tail. He had travelled past with his tribe, who all bore equally colourful scales, and offered to be a guide on the streams. The large mer from the west who had joined them, with dark scaleless torso and bright, bright scales the colour of the above as the shining was swallowed by the water, had made her a box for her trinkets from the strange flat, rippled materials of a submerged landling craft.

They had both been nice, both stayed while the currents were warm, but their gestures had made no permanence with her. They had wanted to settle here, on the edge of the deep, and Katie hadn't quite been ready to commit to a permanent residence. Instead she had travelled with them both, seen their tribes, and now she could safely say that the edge of the chasm was where she belonged.

The long brightwaters Lance’s tribe enjoyed were nice, but there were too many landling boats, and all the noise made her head spines hurt, and messed with her sense of direction. Hunk’s home near the growing-red-water-land was also pleasant, but the sound of the land was uncomfortable, and the waters were too warm for her comfort.

So she had returned, with promises from her two new friends to visit. She’d left them both some eggs, but had no desire to see what became of them, or keep them for her own just yet, instead keen to begin her long, solo journey home, to find out what living as a tribeless mer was like. She found that while she enjoyed the quiet, the loneliness was heavy after many darkwaters had passed.

The shelf at the edge of the deep was the same as always when she returned, and yet there were changes. Iverson’s hatchling, Curtis, was a youngling. Just big enough to help search for whelks amongst the weedforests, or fix the stolen landling nets between his own supervised explorations.

Those same weedforests that she had explored as a youngling were bigger, spreading all the way off the overhand, and down the cliff of the shelf. The one below was strewn with kelp beds where new mollusks grew, and other caves and crevices where her fellow tribe members made their homes were bigger, or sometimes smaller, in number.

The biggest change of all was closer to home however; her pursemate, Matt, had found a permanent companion when she returned. They wouldn't be able to nest, but Shiro was nice, and very good at entertaining the hatchlings from the group nursery while the hunters followed the sharks and shoals of fish. They’d mentioned adopting some eggs the next time someone in either tribe produced a clutch, and seeding them together, but wanted more private time first. Katie liked him.

It was through Siro that she met Keith.

Shiro was from the chasm itself, dark tailed with colourless hair and eyes, and a broad, whale-like tail; the tribe had been friendly with them for a longer than their elders were old, but didn't often meet because the closer the surface waves became, the more the deep-dwellers winced in pain and scrunched their eyes.

Her carers had moved to a lower cave while she was away, closer to the spot where they gathered their black mussels and whelks. The deep tribe had noticed them, and ventured that little bit higher to greet their new, closer neighbours. According to her pursecarrier, Sam, it had only taken Matt days to offer his now-mate kelp-bound strands of oyster stones and woven weed basket offerings of his best clams.

They now had a cave of their own, just a little further down. Enough for Matt to find his way with his echoes and eyes, but not so high that Shiro couldn't see.

It was during a visit to Matt, to get away from the cave and rescue Rover, her little nudibranch, from their pursemaker’s rage (Colleen had threatened to feed him to their octopus, Baebae, after it had eaten her good kelp), that she was met with an unfamiliar mer; one with dark hair, pale scaleless limbs, and a tail as dark as the deep itself but for the luminescent sheen, and eyes to match.

The mer’s name was Keith, and he was a deep dweller. His pursecarrier had once hailed from her own tribe, but he had been caught by the spinning teeth of a landling craft, and his mate had taken their clutch to the depths after they had hatched and scrunched their faces at the clearer waters. He was the only seed-giving mer from a clutch of as many claws on her hand, and another claw, and his eyes were a little better than Shiro’s. 

After Shiro and Matt had retreated to their den for rest, when the shining had been swallowed, they sat on the overhang, talking about their adventures beyond the chasm they both called home, and their return journeys, till the water lightened and the shining emerged from the waves above them once more.

* * *

 

Keith wasn't sure what to make of Katie.

He was reasonably certain that he liked her. She had a lot of interesting stories from her travels to swap with his own. He hadn’t travelled as far as she had when he too grew bored of the trench depths, and had headed along the colder streams, the opposite of her own travels.

It had taken a while to reach the rise in the trench wall, where Kolivan warned him before departure that further progression would lead to landling waters, but he'd already met a few creatures that had been more worrying than the faceless beings he and his pursemates had been taught to avoid as younglings, and traveled up the cliff when the dark waters fell. He continued on, sleeping through the bright waters in secure caves, investigating the new corals and wrecks and strange landling clutter before finally finding another tribe.

That had been a perilous adventure, resulting in the scar on his face and Shiro joining him on his return home, but one he was saving the story for for a joint gathering. One when terrible tales of rival tribes would excite the younglings and make Krolia and Kolivan’s scales fade and flicker in shock (and maybe stand up to Katie’s tales of red-water-mountains).

When he met the upper trench tribe mer, he’d been surprised. Matt had mentioned his pursemate, but nobody had known when or even if she would return, but there she had been upon his first visit to Shiro’s new shared cave. Draped on the edge of cave-mouth shelf, her magnificent scales glimmering in the dull of the surface, the golden sheen reflected as she moved utterly captivating.

Some of the others had mentioned her many attractive qualities, and indeed her scales were beautifully coloured, even to his surface-weak eyes. He found her stories more interesting though, and her skills in a shark hunt.

Not unlike his own pursemates, she was smaller, not an obvious or immediate threat against the sea beast’s rows of teeth and agile movements, but something to consider when considering a hunt. it only took one trip on a joint hun with her to be convinced that her size was no hindrance on her skills.

Katie threw herself into the fray with best of the upper-trench hunters, cutting the creatures fins with a dagger of teeth from other fallen beasts, zipping back and forth, occupying it as the other hunters worked, distracting, attacking its eyes without fear of its maw.

She was magnificent, and after several hunts together, he didn’t think he’d ever seen her afraid. That was, until the night of the wreck.

They were returning with some of the new-finned mers, fresh from their first expedition with stolen landling nets full of fish and rope-cages stuffed with squat shelled-pincers that were always good for tasty meat. It had been a good hunt, and spirits were high as they made their way back towards the shelf overlooking the trench.

Halfway through the return journey, in the dim period when the darkness of the trench, starting to rise and bleed into the lightwater, was almost complete, something dark and vast crossed the surface; it blotted the light from the surface as they made their way towards the shelf reef from a hanging valley above the trench, some ways from the tribe location.

Then the ocean surged, and there was a loud noise that made them drop their catches to protect their head spines for the powerful echoes and disorientating screeching crackles that disturbed the water. Keith dropped his spoils, hands covering his spines, desperate to blot out the terrible sounds.

Then, further disorientating them all, strange hot chunks fell through the surface, the water around them bubbling and hissing as they plummeted towards them. Quickly they all moved, tails beating back and forth as they made a bid for shelter beneath an overhang jutting out from the edge of the cliff.

The water rushed around them, and holding onto a young, terrified mer who had nearly been flatten by the falling rubble with one hand, Keith curled up trying to block the sounds and paralysed by an intolerable shriek that echoed from the hulking black shape that loomed towards the shelf, hurtling towards them faster than anything they had ever seen.  

Realising the mistake, he and the mer quickly pulling away from their hiding place as the vast shape rushed above them into the valley, pulled up to the side as it passed, narrowly missing a strange stick out at its side, like a vast fin, with a quick dive and veer.

The fast moving weighty object slammed into the floor of the valley, skidding along the sand, turning up the dust and corals and rock, a great maw torn into inside by the angry rocks. Hot bright plumes swallowed it as it landed, before disappearing in a dark trail of dust, the warmth felt even across the valley where Keith and and the other mer had fled.

Shaking, Keith looked around at the scene quickly rushing back down the the overhang. “Katie!” His clicked loudly, focusing, listening for the vibrations of movement, searching. His head was ringing from the sound of the calamity, and knew he must look wild-eyed from panic as he tore through the water, dodging the last of the falling rubble as he searched for the upper mer. “Katie!”

Not only the strange echoes, but a thick and mixed scent of blood, many many different kinds and vast in quantity. Fish, crustaceans, and by far the largest scent, something he didn’t recognise. There was a taste of something foul and slimy on the current, that felt like it coated his mouth, inside his nose too, and a scent of something else that made them cough and choke.

“Keith!”

Katie’s clicks managed to echo through the misty dust that had been disturbed and hindered his already poor view. Clicking back, he and the other mers who’d been caught on the wrong side of the valley rushed towards the sound, pulling out from the bank of muddied water to a cleared view.

There, on the opposite wall, crouched in a nook in the cliff and amongst the corals, were the others. Katie shot through the water from her hiding spot, wrapping her arms around him as they collided, dropping in the water before unconscious flips of their fins steadied them again.

“I thought it had crushed you!” she cried. Around them the others were reuniting too, and Keith clung to her, burying his face in the fan of her hair, letting the relief run its course, before pulling back, staring at the fading swirls of sand and dust and broken coral.

The strange four pointed silhouette of the thing that had fallen from the surface showed now, and his arms stayed as close around Katie’s as her own on him.

“Did everyone else make it with you?” he asked hoarsely; the dust tasted strange and sour in his throat, but they had been charged with leading the first hunt for the new adults.

“Everyone but the ones who were with you,” Katie said, her voice distant, body leaning in a little. “We’re lucky. No one looks hurt badly; Ina has a broken fin but that’s it, and it’s not a big one.”

Keith nodded absently, his eyes still on the suspicious thing looming through the dim water. “What in damned deep is that?” he wondered.

“I’ve seen one before, when I stayed with Hunk,” Katie said; her shoulders felt tiny, and Keith gently wrapped his arms closer around her, his fins pressing soothingly to her tail as she spoke. “It’s a landling craft that swims in the great above, but they were always tiny when I saw them before, not like this…”

_ In the great above? _ Keith stared at it again, unable to hold back his shudder, despite his attempts to provide her with some reassurance. Whatever it was, if it was a landling craft, that meant the surface species would soon follow, before leaving the wreck to the whim of the waves.

“We need to go!” she whispered. 

Keith couldn’t agree more. They needed to warn their tribes, before any unwanted company arrived. Hovering close to Katie, and watching the now darkened surface carefully, fearing yet more falling chaos, they gathered the young hunters.

The small group turned from the wreck, and headed as quickly as the current would allow the rest of the way to the trench.

* * *

 

“You said you’d seen this craft before, but have you ever seen a landling?” Keith asked, his words clicking behind her as he followed Katie through the weed forests to the new craft just west of the tribe caves.

For a while, no-one had dared go near the wreck for the disorientating noises and echoes from the machines and the strange objects brought by the landlings who had swarmed it in their fake fins, oversized eyes, and tools with small shinings set inside them.

Katie was bored of waiting for permission, and wanted to investigate the new wreck. It had been a long time since there had been a new one nearby, and this was a chance to learn more about landlings. They rarely came to the chasm, but for a few strange submerged craft that had descended into the depths of the chasm.

Keith had seen those, but not a landling up close. He asked her about them a lot, but frankly he wasn’t missing much for not having seen one. In fact, it was probably a lot sneaking up to the upright columns of their water built paths, like she had with Lance.

“Yeah, I went to stay with a mer who practically lived on the surface once,” Katie nodded as their tails pushed them through the water; the streams of light kelp brushed her scaleless body gently, sliding gently against the webbing between her claws as she pulled it through them, looking for whelks to munch on. “He took me to a waterside place where they all lived.”

“What do they look like?” Keith asked, his dark shark-finned tail pushing him through the water so he moved through it above her, under, then over again.

He was always moving, and where Shiro was one of the strongest hunters when he joined the groups now present in their tribe, Katie had never seen anyone as fast as Keith. He’d caught up to a shoal of tuna once, presenting his catch to her like it had been nothing but a matter of gliding on the currents.

“Weird,” she said bluntly. “They have two tails, but only one fin at the bottom, and it looks broken, but I think that’s so they can move without water,” she tried to explain, thinking about the strange creatures that lived on top of the vast rocky mountains that crested the waves, and sometimes came into her watery world. “But they do have hair.”

Keith frowned, trying to picture her explanation; it probably looked ridiculous, and she couldn't blame the scepticism on his face. “How can they have tails that work if they don't come into the water?”

“I don't know” Katie shrugged. “They’re different, and they don’t have scales, at all. And their claws are blunt. Their fins have them too.”

“They have claws on their fins?” Keith made a face. “They sound kinda creepy,” he said finally. “You're sure they're gone?”

Katie nodded. “They came with their fake fins and took the dead ones away three darkwaters ago; Ina and I snuck over to watch when we were on night rotation with Iverson. They brought their shining tools, and were here all through the lightwater till the next darkwater taking things up to the surface.”

Together they made their way through the water a little further. It was dim, but not dark, a compromise in their exploration trips together, and soon, they crested an outcrop of rock, looking down up at a hanging valley of corals where the strange craft had landed.

Keith sucked in a breath as they looked over at it. “It was hard how big it was before, but it’s huge!”

“Right? Ive never seen a normal wreck this size before!” she asked, pointing to the stange flaps at the side of the massive craft. It was from a strange, hard smooth material, and it had gouged into the reef where it had plummeted from the surface, its pointed end tipped downwards, and torn at the middle.

Keith shook his head, crossing his arms across her shoulders; the water carried his weight as he rested his chin on her head, watching the immobile landling craft in curiosity. “Want to get closer?” he asked, tipping himself so that he hung in front of her, streamlined tail swishing above him before he swirled and headed out into the valley of corals.

Katie grinned, letting herself up form the rock, tail pushing her towards the deep-dweller, doing her best to match his speed; she was fast, but not as long in her tail, so catching up wasn't always easy (especially if they were racing in open water). Keith had slowed to let her rejoin him, and once close enough he coiled around her in greeting, before rising overhead again. Just because there weren't any landlings here now didn't mean there weren't still dangers in approaching the craft, and his bigger mass was a comfort even without fear.

It was long and thin, and far, far bigger than any of the ones she had ever seen before. The strange fins at either side of the construction were almost as long on each side, and slowly–once they had made sure there were no landlings to spot them–she and Keith approached the tear in the side where they could enter.

Inside was even less like the other wrecks.  Instead of nets and lures and the floating balls and ropes was a long room with a narrow doorway, and row after row of the strange furnishings she’d seen landlings use to sit on. There  were two on one side and one on the other, and above them were boxes attached to the top of the ceiling.

Those at least were kind of familiar, and Katie began opening up the compartments closest to the tear in the craft’s shell, sniffing and listening for anything that might be inside. She found boxes made from fibres, and the strange covers landlings draped their scaleless bodies with. Those she stuffed into their travelling pack. They were valuable. They could be unpicked and made into very thin ropes. 

There were other containers too, strange devices that no longer worked, flat things with smooth surfaces that could also be broken and their parts may be utilised in other ways. Keith had travelled further down the long cave-like interior, and the scent in the water suggested he’d found some food. 

Deciding to check a few more of the storage spaces first, she resolved to join him once she'd found some more things of worth. As she rustled, her tail flicking back and forth below her as she rummaged, she didn't immediately notice the bright flashes shining through the water just beyond the crushed opening they had used to enter.

It was after she had discovered how to open one of the fabric boxes, a bit like a big kelp bag, but with sharp corners and flat lines,  and found a plethora of tubes and snacks, landling trinkets and ornaments. She stuffed her kelp bag inside, deciding to utilise the new storage tool, then, she saw her shadow flickering on the smooth wall of the craft.

‘ _ Holy shit, no way! Lotor! You need to come see this! _ ’

“Katie!”

Keith’s call was sharp as it clicked through the water, but it was the strange, echoing sound and the pain that nipped at the tips of her ear spines that alerted her to her immediate danger and she whirled; standing behind her was a landling, a shining tool held directly in Katie’s direction. 

Snarling in dismay, fear and anger (at herself, for not noticing, for being careless!) she curled in on herself as it reached out a clawless limb and–

‘ _ Easy, I won’t hurt you! I just want a pict- Argh! _ ’ 

–swiped at it with her claws, rapidly displaying the sharp, hard, deep-coloured points. The landling let out a gurgle as she caught its arm, slicing at its flesh, bubbles emanating from the strange device that was echoing around its head, letting it breathe. Katie beat at it with her tail, trying to get out of the alcove between the rows that she had been cornered into, snarling and hissing, swiping.

_ ‘Sendak? What going on? I’m coming down on your location from the ba-agh! Shit! I just saw a shark! Get out of there! _ ’

She had to get away. She had to kill it! She swiped her claws at him, wishing she hadn’t left the shark tooth dagger her brother had gifted her for her coming-of-age ceremony at home. This was one of the bigger landlings, with more hair. The stronger ones. It caught her arms before she could scratch his too-big eye coverings off.

‘ _ No, it’s not! It's- _ ’ Katie snarled and screeched, batting viciously with her tail, but its own strange two-tails were sturdy, and one of his fake-fins got a hold of her tail, holding it. Why did it have so many limbs? She was completely trapped in, and the overhanging storage meant she couldn't swim out over the landling’s head. ‘ _ -shit, shit just hold still! _ ’

The landling kept making the strange echoing noises, broke up and difficult to make out, until a streak of luminescent shimmer darted towards them, barreling into the landling’s side. Keith’s powerful tail crashed into the landling’s side, slamming it into the wall.

‘ _ Sendak, there’s a shark you idiot! Get out! _ ’

Wriggling free just enough, she moved quickly, sinking her claws into the landling’s neck, her other hand holding its head for leverage; different tribes had different rules about the surface, but one was absolutely universal.  _ They must never be seen. _

Yanking, she let her claws scrape through the flesh and fibre covering it wore, red blood billowing into the water where she pulled the chunk free, a crunch as its bones snapped with the force of her arms. Keith grabbed the discarded bags and pouch with one hand, the other catching her own outstretched one. Sticking close, her senses pounding, they made it to the other end of the craft, where a hole on the opposite side was visible.

‘ _ Sendak? Sendak?! _ ’

Sneaking out, she paid more attention. Creeping along the side of the craft, she watched through the small transparent rectangles as another human rushed in from the opposite side. Reaching one of the giant colourless fins, they huddled, watching and waiting as the second lifted the first back out, through the tear where they had first entered.

“Are you okay?” Keith asked; his back and tail had curled around her protectively, blocking her smaller back and fins from view should any other humans appear behind them, and the worry in the gesture calming her racing senses.

“I think so…” she nodded. “What about the other one?”

“I’m not sure,” Keith muttred, following as she moved around to the crumpled tip of the craft, watching the two humans as they headed for the bottom of another, which had appeared on the surface some distance above them. “I think I managed to hide, and it didn't follow me when I heard you,” he said, chest heavy with breath as he recovered from the sudden panic. His head spines twitched as he sniffed the water. “We should leave, before more come, or the sharks catch the smell,” he said, an arm on her shoulders. “We’re not safe here.”

* * *

 

They headed back over the rocky crests, lowered into the gaping trench, through the rocky ginnels and back through the weed forests until the familiar corals began to emerge in the darkened water. 

They had been forced to circle the territory for a while to make sure they weren't followed, and once back in  relative safety, they both sunk down onto the sand on the corals just above the caves, where the younglings were taken for their exploration and plays during lightwater.

The water was pitch dark when they arrived, the environment lit up only by the small luminescence in Keith’s scales, where they both slumped together in relief.

“I can't believe you remembered it,” Katie couldn't help laughing, staring at the fine-woven, fibre bag she had found at the wreck.

“After getting into that mess, I’d have been mad if we didn’t get back with something,” Keith mumbled, rolling onto his side. “Are you really sure you’re not hurt?” he asked. The dark tips of his tail fins brushed onto hers, concerned.

“I’m fine,” she assured him, stretching her arms out so he could see the full extent of her scaleless body; her shoulders, her arms, her chest. “See? Not a scratch. Thanks to you.”

“You’d have been fine, and he won’t be following us thanks to you” Keith assured her, sitting up, his eyes scanning her from had to fin-tips, checking her over all the same. “I’ve seen you hunt sharks bigger than that.”

“Landlings and sharks are different,” she shrugged.  Landlings were more intelligent than sharks were. Sharks were dumb. Big, dangerous brutes sometimes, but not very intelligent in comparison to Mer. Landlings were dangerous because they were the opposite.

“Either way, you were fantastic,” Keith insisted. He took her hands, turning her arms over, running the soft tips beneath his claws across her body in search of injury. Amused and piqued by the attention, Katie allowed him to examine her. 

The warm feel of the sensation bled lower as he checked her body, hand moving to her shoulders and gills, then lower, over the mounds of her torso just as gently, bathed the rush and flaring energy of their encounter aboard the wreck in something else; more sedate, but just as warm and thrilling, for different purposes.

Seeing she had his attention, she flicked the end of her tail softly on the sand, almost coquettish as his hands pressed gently on her scales, checking for any scars or wounds she might have missed. “So?” she asked, innocently. “Am I in one piece?”

Keith stared at her, and she didn’t miss the way his angular fins shook, moved by the shudders of invitation growing between them. His desire to chase her was clear, travelling through his body to sharp, intent, deep, preparatory flicks of his tail fin. “Completely,” he murmured, distracted, but focus undivided from her as her fins caressed his scales.

Katie sat up, his hand still on the seam of her scaleless body where her torso ended and tail began. Her chest no longer hurt from fear and the fast, exhausting beats of her tail as they had fled for safety, but it throbbed still; catching the wafting fan of her hair as it billowed around her shoulders, she tilted her head, looking up at Keith, combing her hands through it, a little curious.

He hadn't brought her any courting gifts, but she definitely wanted him to chase her. More than any other mer she had followed on her travels. Lance and Hunk had given her gifts and treasures, and praised her skills before she had invited them to chase, and while tonight hadn't been her shining moment, Katie knew her worth.

She was a good hunter, with a good sense of direction and knowledge of waters beyond their own, and glamorous colourings; she was an asset to her tribe. She deserved  _ proper _ courting gifts, and it would take many of worth for her to leave her tribe for one of her own. Did she want Keith to do that? 

That was a different question, but after tonight? After watching the heave of muscle in Keith’s tail when he rushed to aid her? After witnessing his playful nature as they headed to the wreck, and how much care he’d taken to put himself between her and potential danger? Katie would dare any other mer to deny how appreciated that would make them feel, challenge them to say they wouldn’t want him to chase them too.

And he had managed to get her bag of landling things. Even if she had been the one to gather the spoils, Keith had retrieved them for her at great risk. That was impressive. As were the seed-organs she had seen lying flat against his underside, tucked carefully within the fins protruding just halfway down his long, dark tail.

Leaning in, she let his hands rest on her sides, clicking appreciatively, before slipping out of his grasp with a few flicks of her tail. Stopping some distance away, pausing just for a moment, swaying from side to side with deliberate enticing flicks, unmistakable movements.

He watched her, uncomprehending for a few moments, before the confusion disappeared like the tracks of shelled-pincers on the sand in fierce, quick currents. As she watched his understanding grow, she also watched ripple of strength under his scales, the shift of his fins, across the flesh of his chest as he rose from the sand, suspended in the water with intent and anticipation

His eyes pierced through the water, their gaze bright in the dark and direct as he waited. Thrill ran down the fin on her back, and she took off again, making the most of the head start. Before she could reach the next outcrop, Keith’s arms wrapped around her, tail winding smooth against her own. 

Twisting in his grip, Katie leaned up and kissed him, letting her arms drape around his neck, and any more questions faded from his lips, absorbed in her kisses. He responded with gentle bites to her lower lip, his hands holding her waist and tangling into her hair as their weight dragged them back to the sands below.

Landing with gentle bump on the softer floor of the shelf, sand shifted and stirred through the water as Keith’s mass and weight began to pin her beneath him. Against her underside she could feel the shift of his seed organs, twisting towards her instead of following the downward line towards his tailfin; his anticipation for their coupling was echoed by the flutter of her protective fins, not yet ready to display her opening, but impatient and enticing for a reliable partner.

Grinning, Katie flicked one of her side fins, spinning herself atop him instead, kicking more sand as Keith’s back hit the shelf, surprise to her smug smirk. He might be bigger, and longer in the tail than her, but it would take more than kisses to catch her. She was few and picky with her partners, and would not be snatched by his attention so easily. She wanted more.

Keith stared at her, like he was watching the lightwater pierce the deep, and curled his lips in amusement, sharp fine teeth displayed. As she propelled her self up, intended to give him a race again, his tail curled and dragged at the tip of her own, just before she could wriggle away, pulling her back flush to him.

Faster and firmer, the rest of his tail curled and twined around her length, flipping her firmly, hands burying her wrists into the sand, letting his weight fall on her fully, securely wrestling her beneath him. Satisfied, he began to sweetly blow against the gills of her neck, making her giggle and squirm, testing Keith’s grip on her (which she found  _ much _ better) until his kisses returned.

His scales felt warm and smooth under her hands, and she hummed appreciatively at the firm spines in his back fins, the muscle that spanned from his scaleless shoulders into the thick, strong tail, wrapped firm and tight to her own, exposed underside.

Her finer fins fluttered at her side, brushing over his scales encouragingly as she lost herself in the kisses, the warm weight coiled around her, the feel of his hands as they slipped over her chest, thumbs toying with the hardened nubs of skin, moulding to her small mounds appreciatively.

“Your scales look like the shining when they shimmer,” he clicked, pressing his kisses over her gills, the feeling shuddering through her with the slower, deliberate attention that lined her jaw, and the small sucks and gnaws he gave to the hollow of her throat. “They're prettier than sea-stones…” 

The tingles dancing on her body like the pleasant, heat sting of an anemone–at first only superficial–sunk deeper like the darkness that overflowed from the trench to stain the ocean beyond as he held her body steady; finding her opening, teasing the slit open with one pad. Taking great care to pull back the sharp tip, Keith sunk it between her protective fins. Katie gasped, bubbles spilling from her lips as she cried out, the instinctive flutter of her side-fins disturbing the sand.

The particles glimmered in the darkwater, shining from the light of the luminous patches and lines in Keith’s scales, like the smallshines that decorated the dark above when she surfaced sometimes. His hand worked, pressing back and forth against her, rolling her pebble back and forth, slowly adding a second, the pads deep and gentle in the walls of her cavern, drawing out the deep feeling that swallowed and contorted her, in body and voice.

“Keith, Keith, Keith, Keith, Keeiiiith…..!” she gasped, pressing her lips to his chin, the scar on his face, almost finding a peak at the dark urge in his gently glowing eyes. She dragged her lips across his jaw, nipping encouragingly, her claws a mess in his hair. Moaning at the build and break and build and break, she collapsed into the buoyant sand.

As his steady attention continued, he pressed one of the pads not deep inside her against the softer, delicate scales that surrounded her slit, hidden by her fins and the sensations of pleasure were a fierce combination. The firn ridges and shape of his underside (lower than the protective ones now flat to show his seed organs) fins pressed across hers, moulding to her underbelly, pulling the stimulation to the very end of her body, making her sweeping tail fins curl and unfold to her cries and his rhythm.

Stretching out, displaying herself as she gripped into the sand, she willed her protective fins to flatten fully, and open completely to the attentive mer. She wanted him. Surely he could smell it on the water? How much he was making her feel? How satisfying Keith’s attention was? She wanted to pull away from him again, just so he could hunt her down and catch her all over again.

Small gasps continues to bubble from her lips as he leaned back, looming over her, watching her as she lost herself for him. Her fins from her back, to her sides and to her tailfins, and smaller ones, all in turn flashed all the shades of the sea forests, signalling brightly in the dark as she eyed his underbelly; lighter than the deep-dark colours of his tail, his underbelly was a lighter colour, akin to some of the deeper, night glowing anemones and stingfish. She eyes the sharper edges of his torso and shoulders appreciatively, and the outline of his seed organs, the colourless, viscous fluid being pulled in thin strands by the currents as it reached the tips.

He was so much bigger than her, almost twice her size; most mer were, but caught beneath him it was so much more welcomely clear. He held her gently, but she could feel the heaviness in his tail’s grip, the ease at which it held her in place. He uncurled slowly, enough to move, his arms around her back, caressing her backfin through her shudders of anticipation.

Keith fluttered little kisses on her neck and cheeks as he shifted, murmuring deep, intimate words on the colour of her scales, her claws, his clicks deep and welcoming as they gripped a little sharply on his shoulders when he pressed into her. The water held most of his weight, but she felt consumed where he wrapped around her, his arms, the vast sweep of his tail fin pressing on hers as his body moved, moving deeper and deeper into her until his underside was flush against her own, warm, and encompassing.

Her cries fell into lower clicks as he moved, pressing firmly, almost crushing her into the sand at her back. Almost, but not quite; his body only fell on her just enough to provide the thrill of close bodies and tingles of pleasure from their union. He was welcome on her, and Katie revelled in the feeling as the small granules scraped her shoulders as Keith pressed into her.

Her body felt like it was being rippled, like the fresh currents through the upper layers of the chasm, as pleasure rolled through her. She knew her peak was soon, and she pulled his head down, pressing their lips together with a fresh hunger as his movements became firmer, harder, deeper.

The end of his tail wrapped a little tighter, and his arms were soft around her waist as her voice bubbled free, her peak a firm crash of seafoam on sand. His movements continued until the last of the shakes echoing through her, shoulders to fins, had dimmed to small tingles.

The corals around them were devoid of fish, scared to their dens by their encounter. Sand glimmered in the water around them still, joined by the bubbles that had captured her voice, and small strands of Keith’s seed.

He rolled onto his side, parting their bodies where they joined, but holding her still, his tail gently caressing her fins, not for repeat affairs, but calming and gentle. For a long moment, she basked with him, watching the ripples of the surface far above. She wondered if his eyes were strong enough to see the great above like this, during the darkwater’s rise from the depths.

It would be nice to see the surface with him, show him the distant glows where the landlings lived, play on the rocks, watch the strange creatures that glided through the above like they through the sea.

Absently she wondered if she would be able to produce any eggs. They wouldn’t be viable without more seed, but one coupling usually left her with a few. She wondered if she would want to keep them if she did. She didn’t know, and would have to wait to see. Did Keith even want her eggs?

“So, if I wanted to give you courting gifts…” Keith said hesitantly, his echoes of his voice breathy and a little flustered, and not from the exertion. “…would you accept them?”

Katie leaned back, considering the earnest, hopeful fumbled face. One of his pads brushed softly over her shoulder, and she rested herself languidly against the support of his arms, batting her fins and tail back and forth in sedate play against his, coiling a strand of her hair around a claw. 

“I want shiny things,” she informed him pointedly. “And landling trinkets.” 

* * *

Keith didn't normally consider himself an especially lucky mer, but following the night of the brush with death at the eerie wreck, he considered himself very, very lucky.  

Not only because he and Katie had escaped potential death at the hands of landlings, but because (somehow) acting as any good mer of any tribe ought to, he had impressed Katie enough that she’d not only allowed, but overtly encouraged what ought only to have been the attention earned by a mer in the most intimate stages of delivering her courting gifts.

He didn't think himself so lucky to chance it a second time though. Not only was that cocky and arrogant, it would have been incredibly insulting if he hadn't found the best deep-damned trinkets he could find from the lower wrecks, the ones Katie couldn't reach even with help from her echoes.

Also his pursemates–who had teased him to no end when he returned to the deep-caves with the scent of another mer hanging on his fins–would never have forgiven him if he’d done less. Romelle and Acxa especially would have scratched him with their claws if he so much as dared be so disrespectful. 

Katie was also worth the effort, and if it hadn't been for the stupid landlings, he might already have found something for her at the mysterious finned wreck, given after an exciting, but less eventful exploration, with kind words and shyer encouragements.

The first was a human decoration of sorts, on a round strip, the colour of a dulled shining, or young kelp, with a hole in the middle. The tones in it were the colours of the above, with completely transparent ones too. Katie had squealed with excitement when he presented it to her, immediately pulling it into one of the weaves she kept in her hair, so it didn't float around her face too much, alongside some of her favourite shells.

Glad that his first gift had gone down very well, they'd gone for another exploration, this time deeper, on the fringes of Katie’s visibility, and she’d led him into one of the unoccupied caves for another private encounter, away from the eyes of her tribe. When they emerged, sated and still a little coquettish with each other, Keith began to wonder if he’d been blessed by the deep.

The second gift things he found were not from the wrecks-that took longer-but he wove some good baskets from kelp and stuffed them with clams as large as his hands from the deep parts of the trench; the upper tribe always traded highly for them, and Keith knew they were one of Katie’s favourites.

Katie had not dragged him into a cave, but she had dragged him to her home nest, showed her purseholders’ the jewel, and introduced him to them. He’d been allowed to stay through the darkwater than head back down the trench. He would have been fine–he  _ was _ a deep-dweller–but the invitation was kind, and resting in Katie’s nest simply because she wanted him to was a very, very, welcome experience.

The last gift, he thought had gone well. It had been from one of the ancient wrecks. One of the ones Kolivan had heard talks of the sinking about from his pursemaker’s pursemaker. It was creaking and full of strange spires and ropes, crusted in limpets and young corals. There were still plenty of curiosities to be had inside, mostly thanks to the sharks.

It was and a them, along with big squids, sparkfish, and the sickly bottom feeders whose spines caused a mer to rot away. His rite-of-passage had been to enter it and emerge the other end of the craft, and just like that ceremony, it had taken some doing to get inside safely. 

Happily, he'd managed to make his way in, with help from Shiro, and come out with only a small bite on his tail for the effort of procuring the storage box.

It was locked, and he didn't know what was inside, but he hoped that the discovery would be intriguing enough by itself. He'd delivered it to Katie later the same evening, and her pursemaker–Coleen–had been as horrified by the scrape as Shiro. Katie had rescued him only by promising to see to the wound herself.

Once paste had been applied to stem the blood, Katie had dragged him off up to the overhang to open the box. They'd broken the fastening on the front with some rocks easily, and inside had been a mix of things, including a rounded object with a spinning stick and strange engravings, a small bag with more jewels, woven materials, and some strange things with flimsy fibre sheets that almost disintegrated to touch, but thick outer coverings. There were lots of those.

Keith had been sure the gift had been well received, especially given the luck he’d found in the contents, but after that, Katie had been acting strange. Normally when he travelled up to trench to visit her, she was swimming around, either talking to the others in her tribe, stuck with youngling watch, or out helping their hunters.

But recently she had been inside; she hadn't turned him away, but also hadn't been willing to leave the cave, preferring to stay in her nest and coil herself around him, rest in his arms. It wasn't an unpleasant task, but it concerned him. She wasn't herself, and she was pale and tired, grumpy. She’d assured him she hadn't been stung by a float-fish, but he was still worried with her mixed demeanour and lack of energy. Eventually, she stopped venturing from her nest at all, disconnecting even from Sam and Colleen. Matt had told him when he visited Shiro, and Keith had asked if he had heard anything.

It had only been two hands of lightwater’s but, when he made he way up from his own home nest, after talking to his pursemaker, who had listened (and simply urged him to keep paying Katie proper care and attention until she was ready to talk about what bothered her), he was still worried. No thanks to his pursemates.

Romelle and Ezor had been grinning and giggling throughout the whole thing, but Narti, as usual, had no comment. Zethrid had been as baffled as he had, and angry, wondering if his upper-tribe mer had been making a mockery of his courtship, threatening to hunt her for him. Acxa hadn’t even stuck around to listen, choosing instead to ignore his concerns for his potential mate’s welfare in favour of a joint shark hunt. 

Keith couldn’t blame her. Their pursemates were a pain in the neck, and he’d wished he’d never asked following their reactions. He could have figured it out himself without their helpful input, he was certain.

In any case, he’d followed Krolia’s advice, and made his way up the trench to visit again, as he had been each day, a string of opalescent shells in hand, the swirled shapes tinted like his luminescence in colour. The last thing he’d expected was to find Katie herself, flicking back and forth at the edge of the lower cave they’d found after he’d given her his first gift, her fins ruffling impatiently in the water.

“Katie?” he asked, propelling himself towards her with a few strong flicks of his tail. “Are you feeling better?”

She looked a bit better than she had before, not pale, or tired. Fresher, and there was a glimmer in her eyes that was new and strong, excited. “I’m better,” she informed him confidently. “I'm sorry I asked Colleen to keep you out,” she sighed, leaning her head onto his shoulder contentedly. 

As Keith rested his fins gently on her scales, their weight pulled them down onto the ledge at the edge of the cave, and he lightly wrapped her fine transparent, glimmering fins with his tail. “You weren't feeling well,” he reasoned, as she leaned in close for kisses and soft attention.

He happily returned them, glad to see she was her usual self. “But what are you doing down here?” he asked curiously holding out the string of shells; she all but snatched them with appreciative clicks, hanging it several times on her arm before rewarding him with a stream of kisses to his cheeks. “Don’t you normally join the shark hunts around now?

He was almost disappointed when her attention started, and she pulled up into the water. “I have to show you something!” she said, clasping his hand and leading him from the ledge into the cave. At the back, where they had nested before were some luminescent algae clusters, and in their light it was easy to see the box he had brought her.

Before his fins could droop, Katie shot up and kissed him again. “I’m not returning it, I promise,” she said. “But I need to show you, and this was the easiest way to move them.”

“Them?” he blinked, following and looking uncertainty at the box. It didn't look any different, and Katie was wearing the shells and decorations he’d found for her. He didn't think she had taken them off since he started bringing her courting gifts.

On closer examination of the cave too, he could see storebags of kelps, and fish, hunting equipment stacked in one alcove, more glowing algae piles, and he could see Rover resting an a piece of coral on a shelf. It looked like a real cave now, like she had moved in.

“Just open it, please,” she begged, flitting back and forth, tugging anxiously on her hair, nudging him with her tail fin before returning to circle the nest overhead, impatient.

A bit disconcerted by the odd behaviour, and Keith quickly did as requested, unfastening the latch, and opening the box. At first he wasn't sure what he was looking at. Then he saw it. A thick green membrane amongst the soft layers and the brighter, purple centres. There was really no doubt for what the contents were.

Eggs.  _ Eggs _ . Those were deep-damned eggs. A small cluster of them, a claw’s less than a hand’s worth and less another, resting amongst the soft kelps and landling materials in the protective layer of their purse, which was yet to harden and form its protective barrier. 

Of course she would start producing eggs after a coupling. Keith felt as dumb as a shark for not releasing earlier what might be ailing Katie sooner, and yet, he still felt felt as though his eyes were playing tricks on him

“Are those eggs?!” 

Katie’s eager impatience turned into something more irritable. “Well, they’re not clam-stones, genius. What else were you expecting? I’m not a dolphin! We were courting, and you've been so attentive, and I knew you’d be a good mate so…” 

Keith stared at the eggs, processing everything that had led to this revelation; namely a coupling following the rush and thrill of a life-threatening encounter with landlings, and the numerous ones that had followed in conduction with traditional gifts. Warm conversation, shared adventure and passion.

“Well?”

Keith looked up from the eggs as the anxious mer flicked her glorious tail back and forth in the water almost impatiently, worry in her eyes as hands curled, like she was keeping herself from taking the box back, her desire to protect the precious spheres keen already, even from him.

“Well, what?” he asked, tentatively, not sure what he was being asked. Well he did. He just hardly believed it. 

Katie snarled a little, crossing her arms. “Do you want to seed them or not?” she demanded, twitching where she floated on the slight current. “They're already three lightwaters old.” Her face was hard, on the verge of hurt. “If you don’t want them, say so. I know Matt and Shiro would adopt them.”

Katie had her pick of any mer’s seed but she wanted  _ his! _ That though made him think carefully on if he wanted to carry the eggs, look after the purse alongside Katie, source the kelps and roe they would need to grow into younglings. They needed to be seeded, and soon. Left without, they would shrivel and fade, unless someone else courted Katie enough before then, or as she suggested, adopted them.

Keith could help clicking irritably at the thought. “Of course I do,” he said, quickly taking the box. It didn't take long, and Katie held herself tight and coiled as she watched. Once done, he closed the lid, placing it safely back in the nest. Then he looked back at at the upper mer.

He was at a bit of a loss for words. He was still processing, but he was happy, and opened his arms. Katie barrelled into him faster than an eel, coiling up close and knocking him back into the piles of kelp and seaweed knotted into a soft comfy nest.

“Hey, watch the eggs!” he blurted, grabbing a hand out for the box. “Does this mean we’re mated now?” he asked, his hopeful tone impossible to keep to himself as he looked around.

Katie chirped in amusement, but inspected the container all the same, a little anxious until she opened and found them to one perfectly safe still. “Well I traded for this cave, and asked you to seed my eggs,” she grinned, closing it again, and wriggling into his space a little more gently. “I don't think it gets more official than that.”

Keith let her settle, trying to comprehend the wave of shock and awe and happiness. “I don't have a clue how to look after eggs,” he realised.

“I don’t either,” Katie admitted. “It’s going to be a different kind of adventure, that’s for sure, but if I didn’t think we could do it, I’d have just fed them to Rover, or Baebae. I knew we were ready, we’ve mostly just been courting for the sake of it. ” she said confidently, with a short pause. “That and all the shiny things. I  _ liked _ those.”

Keith gently coiled his tail around hers, the softened, more flexible fins so different against his own sturdier, horizontal ones, and pressed a kiss to her cheek. “I think you’re right,” he agreed. A thought came to his head, and he smirked, pressing his lips to her neck and gills. “You are right…” he rephrased, tail wrapping around hers. “...but know what being right means?”

Katie had leaned back, contented vibrations in her throat from the snug and eager attention. “What does it mean?” she asked, with a little feigned ignorance.

“It means…” he murmured, hands slipping over her torso, towards her protective fins. “...we can matemark.”

Katie grinned, stretching in his arms with a pleased expression. “Well, then” she clicked. “We should get started.”

And, after first moving their precious treasure box of the dark and lightwaters to come from the nest, they did.

* * *

I’m glad we got to spend this time together. Huge thank yous to KDXArt for helping grammar wrangle, and Fairia for helping logic the logistics of fantasy creature biology.

If anyone wants to know more about this AU (bc I have an inkling for smaller drabbles later) DM on [Tumblr](https://kidge-kat.tumblr.com/) or @ me on Discord :) 


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